Film Review: Supergirl (2026) ★ ★½ (Spoilers)

I expected the DCU's sophomore outing to be at most out of balance - it is, but there are tonal, scripting and acting problems that make Supergirl not work for me. Where Superman at least got the tone right, Craig Gillespie's film wants to be all things to all people, and fails to reconcile the paradoxes within it, from the often bad writing to the relentless grimness, despite the excellent material this story is drawn from. On paper Ana Noguerira adapts Tom King's Woman of Tomorrow book well enough, but the differences matter - why is r*pe culture inserted into a 12A movie? Why was Kara and Ruthie's relationship so dumbed down from King's story, and why make vague stabs at character development for Alcock's Kara, only to undermine it all with her shocking actions in the final act? For that matter why keep the film relentlessly grim and depressing? Kara's depression is real, but there's no lightness or fun in this film at all, or at least not until Jason Momoa's Lobo appears.

That said there's no reason at all for Lobo in this film. Momoa is superb, I'm sure we'll see him again in the DCU, but Lobo added about as much to the narrative as every blurred, incoherent action sequence. There were a fair number of them, none of them fun, and only the final extended fight leads to a character change for Kara, which inexplicably undermines the character and makes a mockery of her history of heroism even greater than her cousin's. In fact there's no-one to like in this film, despite Millie Alcock's best efforts, but even Lobo and Ruthie's brief team up demonstrates just how little chemistry there is between Alcock and Ridley, and how little the script asks of them.

Spider-Noir has recently shown it's possible to branch out into wild tonal differences from what we might expect from on screen superhero stories, but Supergirl wants to be both establishing and challenging at the same time, and in the end achieves neither well. That Kara should end the film an antihero robs the character of the depth and integrity viewers need to see at this early stage of the MCU - there's no charm, no fun, no wit, and no insight (which is in King's book). That Clark and Krypto lighten the mood occasionally only accentuates how flimsy the script is, and that the distaff Kryptonian member of the fledgling Superman family isn't strong enough to hold this important outing together on her own. I'm really disappointed.